


Awakening

by josephina_x



Series: Dimension 46'\-F [3]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Gen, Post-Series, Post-Weirdmageddon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-30
Updated: 2018-07-16
Packaged: 2019-03-11 16:06:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13527792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josephina_x/pseuds/josephina_x
Summary: Somebody is having a (really) bad (several) day(s) in The Game.Somebodyelseis having a bad day in what they consider to be real life, and has been dreading something like this happeningvery soonfor several weeks now -- mainly because said individual is observant enough to not miss when somebody’s eyes go yellow and slitted no matter how momentarily, still doesn’t have an alternative energy source for their quantum destabilizer, and was never really sure exactly how the Zodiac Circle was supposed to work in the first place.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Fic: Awakening  
> Fandom: Gravity Falls  
> Pairing: n/a  
> Rating: PG-13  
> Spoilers: through the end of the series, and some of the books (Journal #3)  
> Summary: Somebody is having a (really) bad (several) day(s) in The Game. 
> 
> Somebody _else_ is having a bad day in what they consider to be real life, and has been dreading something like this happening _very soon_ for several weeks now -- mainly because said individual is observant enough to not miss when somebody’s eyes go yellow and slitted no matter how momentarily, still doesn’t have an alternative energy source for their quantum destabilizer, and was never really sure exactly how the Zodiac Circle was supposed to work in the first place.  
>  Disclaimer: Not mine, not for profit.  
> AN: Yep. Sigh.

\---

…………………………………………………………….  
. System message: LOCATION SHIFT IMMINENT! .  
…………………………………………………………….  
New location: Milky Way galaxy, Orion spiral arm, Sol star, Terra, at planetary coordinates [44°12'04.2"N, 127°00'52.6"W]  
……………………………………………………….  
. System message: LOADING, PLEASE WAIT! .  
……………………………………………………….  
Location shift complete. Resuming gameplay in 3… 2… 1… RESUMING!!

\---

Nnnnn… what. is going… on…

Am… am I in… a body?

...with two eyes… and...

Wh’...

 _Ow._ Blinking eyes open... should _not_ hurt... this… muc...

Head. Ow. I… ugn.

Light is… _Hurts._ Who is… that a...

\--Nngn! Clenched _teeth_ , everything _hurts_ , I can’t-- _can’t--!_

Aaaaah. ...aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...

C-Can’t. Can’t. can’t move...

...Wh-why is everything… fading out...

\---

…  
…  
…  
...  
...  
...  
...  
…………………………………………………………….  
. System message: LOCATION SHIFT IMMINENT! .  
…………………………………………………………….  
New location: Milky Way galaxy, Orion spiral arm, Sol star, Terra, at planetary coordinates [43°41'22.5"N, 124°07'07.1"W]  
……………………………………………………….  
. System message: LOADING, PLEASE WAIT! .  
……………………………………………………….  
Location shift complete. Resuming gameplay in 3… 2… 1… RESUMING!!

\---

Ow. _Again_. What the ever-loving--

Tssssst. Oh. --I’m in a body again, all right. Ow. _Really_ need to get that pain-inverting mod transferred over ASAP. Oof. ...At least it doesn’t hurt nearly as bad anymore?

...That _was_ just a nasty blip in my display and my pain feeds, right?

Wait. Hold on. Am I even in the same body as I was just in two seconds ago? What was with that second location shift right in a row? What’s going on?

Oh. Oh, what the _hell_.

\---

User-defined timer: T+0 years, 9 months, 29 days, 7 hours, 2 minutes, 45 seconds, 97 milliseconds… and counting!

\---

I… That wasn’t anywhere _close_ to the count a little while ago. I… I’m...

...I’m _missing time?!_

\--The system should’ve logged me off! I can’t fall asleep in here! Nobody can! It just doesn’t work like that!

Oh. Oh no. No no no. I didn’t have another black-out again, did I? Bill--

\--no. Okay, no. No, I didn’t. There are no messages from Bill. It can’t have been that. I didn’t black-out, because he didn’t have to take over.

So what just _happened_ , then?

Ugh. Okay, first order of business: open eyes, sit up, look around.

Check. Check. And--

Uh.

Wait. Wasn’t that guy there the last time I tried to--

\---  
_??? name ???_  
\-- NPC, Level 58 --  
Character build: Science-hero  
Weapon specialty: gun-wielding  
Aggro quotient: **HIGH**  
Relationship: **angry** , weapon-equipped  
\---

\--Oh _shit!!_ “No, WAIT!!” AAAA--

\---

…  
…  
…  
...  
...  
...  
...

\---


	2. Chapter 2

\---

Ow. And ow. Also: ow.

...Okay. Let’s review! In a body. In The Game. _Everything hurts._ Just got hit in the head by a freaking NPC, which _did not help matters_. --How much time am I missing this time?

\---

User-defined timer: T+0 years, 9 months, 29 days, 7 hours, 23 minutes, 17 seconds, 2 milliseconds… and counting!

\---

...Okay. Well, _great_. That’s just great. A little over twenty minutes, _gone_. Not as bad as it could have been, but still pretty messed up and wrong because **that’s not supposed to happen** , just like everything _else_ that’s been going on since I logged back in today.

Oh, and apparently I am being _stalked by NPCs_ **again** , because that person was _definitely_ the same one as before. He was freaking standing _right there_ for the last two location shifts, which is _never_ a good sign -- and should never be a thing, because I _warned_ Bill a long time ago about _EXACTLY_ what I would do to him and all his _stupid_ little games with all his _stupid_ little NPC pawns if he _EVER_ screwed up so badly as to have any backlash from his dumb _shenanigans_ impacting _my_ playtime EVER AGAIN after the _LAST TIME--!!!_

...Alright, Will. Breathe. Just _breathe._ ...Okay. ...Okay.

Okay. Things are screwed up, because Bill is an idiot. But. _Maybe_ this isn’t _completely_ his fault. _Maybe_ this NPC is some AXOLOTL worshipper or something. That’s a thing. One of those status effects I’ve got is probably a “black mark” against me or a reputation-debuff or something, of the kind that most demons get slapped with after an AXOLOTL visit for awhile. I’ve heard of those before. --I’ve HAD those before, when we’ve broken Rule #2 _on purpose_ before, to trick the AXOLOTL into rolling back time to our own advantage! It’s _probably_ just one of a severity level that I’m just not used to seeing in the laundry list of icons I’ve got littering up my inner eye in the status effects and debuffs column right now.

It’s probably just that. It’s fine. It’s fine! I can handle this. This is a normal thing. Bill did a stupid thing with the AXOLOTL, stepping into an AXOLOTL-laid trap, so _of course_ we got hit by some AXOLOTL-level penalty. Of course we did. And it’s not like Bill would know or care if we got hit with one of those again; that’s normal too. Everything’s fine! It’s _probably_ not Bill having pulled some dumb shit with yet another NPC again that he didn’t resolve before passing me the baton, or at _least_ had the common courtesy to freaking _warn_ me about before I had to deal with it. Right? --Right.

Right. Nothing to worry about. Business as usual! … _Sure._

Deep breaths. Yes. Okay. Okay.

Okay. Let’s try this again. Sit up, open my eyes...

\--Oh, no, _not again--!!_

\---  
_??? name ???_  
\-- NPC, Level 58 --  
Character build: Adventurer  
Weapon specialty: brass knuckles  
Aggro quotient: --  
Relationship: confused  
\---

\--arms up - _arms up - ARMS UP!_ \-- _ **NOT IN THE EYE!!**_

Wait, hold on. No aggro.

Hey. That’s not… the same guy. Is it?

...No, can’t be. Weapon specialties don’t change in twenty minutes for NPC’s above Level 21. ...Weird, he kinda _looks_ the same, though. -Ish. Same-ish?

Pssh, _‘confused’_ \-- hah! You and me both, buddy.

\-- _Wait._ An NPC **adventurer?!** _Seriously??_

‘All-Seeing Eye: target closest level 58 NPC with adventurer build, max range 1 meter, and display all character information compiled to-date’!

What the-- OW!! OW-ow-OW!

Shit! That freaking HURT! ...And nothing came up. -- _That mod isn’t working?!?!?_ That’s my main go-to for _**EVERYTHING I DO WHEN I’M PLAYING!!!**_

\--Bill, you idiotic little moron, _so help me--!_

...I am _stuck_ using normal demon skills. _This_ is what I am reduced to for gathering information.

I am _stuck_ using BASIC demon skills ONLY, while sending a bunch of spider-bots crawling down through all our logfiles, crossing my fingers and _hoping_ that there’s something in there that will help me try to figure out who the heck this actually is, and maybe extract any other useful data about this NPC that might be stored somewhere in there from Bill’s prior play sessions -- if I’m _lucky_ and can find anything.

Specifying ‘Adventurer class NPC’s should narrow it down to an almost-nil chance of getting anyone else other than this specific NPC, even without a name, but...

...with the bots’ speed likely restricted to the constraints of the body I’m currently in, and subject to whatever other debuffs that might impact them that I’ve probably got going on, they likely won’t be back to me with anything at all anytime soon. Not in a workable timeframe.

Which means I’m pretty much playing _blind_ here. I HATE playing blind! --I like knowing things for a reason, y’know! And Bill knows this!

\--I _really_ hope you’re happy, Bill. I _really_ hope it was worth it, whatever that whole ‘thing with the AXOLOTL’ bit was.

...Fine. _Fine!_ Common demon skills. Can’t believe I’m actually having to… so freaking _stupid_ and _annoying_... just... _rrrrrrrrr_ \--

‘analysis skill: display character build subtypes’

\-- _rrrRRRrrr_ \--

\---  
_??? name ???_  
\-- NPC, Level 58 --  
Character build: Adventurer (subtypes: multi-class, balanced-build)  
Weapon specialty: brass knuckles  
Aggro quotient: --  
Relationship: confused  
\---

\-- _rrRRRRG_ , wait. ...The heck?

He’s not only an adventurer, he’s _also_ multi-class? And The Game system classifies him as _balanced?_ \--I gotta see this!

‘analysis skill: display character class’!

\---  
_??? name ???_  
\-- NPC, Level 58 --  
Character build: Adventurer (subtypes: multi-class, balanced-build)  
Class: --multi-class--  
Weapon specialty: brass knuckles  
Aggro quotient: --  
Relationship: confused  
\---

The double-heck?? It’s like the system’s fighting me, here!

‘analysis skill: display character class subclasses’!

\---  
_??? name ???_  
\-- NPC, Level 58 --  
Character build: Adventurer  
Class: --multi-class-- (subclasses: --multi-class--)  
Weapon specialty: brass knuckles  
Aggro quotient: --  
Relationship: confused  
\---

No way. --Since when do NPC’s get to take on multiple classes that _aren’t_ displayable?

...And the subtype listing just disappeared on me, too. Something’s definitely, _actively_ trying to keep me locked out of the information, and that’s not supposed to happen; things don’t ‘re-hide’ themselves on demons after we figure them out, and certainly not me. ...Not when my All-Seeing Eye’s working, anyway.

Could this be one of those bazillion crazy unknown debuffs, messing with me? I’d never heard of any debuffs that could do _that_ , alone or in combination, but then again… most demons I’ve ‘overheard’ in-Game accidentally letting Game mechanics slip aren’t exactly the smartest ones of the bunch, so they likely wouldn’t _recognize_ that was what was happening to them. ...If they even realized that something was happening at all.

That still shouldn’t happen, though, this ‘rehiding’ of information; if it was just some random debuff, I shouldn’t be able to access it in the first place, right? --This NPC’s like a mystery wrapped inside another mystery!

“Problem, kid?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”

\---

...Wait, what?

I… I’m stunned here. Seriously, stunned. This is _UNREAL_. I’m literally sitting here, blinking stupidly at this NPC like _I’m_ the freaking NPC, trying to not freak the flip out. Because--

_Did that just come through on private chat?_

\--NPC’s aren’t able to do that! Yes, this NPC just talked out loud, and I heard the NPC’s words through my audio interface, but his words are also _here_. Floating right in the forefront of my mind’s eye, in a private chat window interface, _as text_.

Not a log window. Not a quest-query prompt. A _private chat window interface_.

“You’ve been staring at me like…”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”

\---

...aaaand I didn’t even prompt the NPC in any way and now he’s just continuing on. -- _Nothing_ about this is normal. Not in my experience. This shouldn’t be happening.

NPCs can’t contact demons through the private chat interface -- only other demons can do that with each other. But here he is, doing it. There’s no way for a demon to mask themselves as an NPC, either -- that’s the kind of stuff that gets you caught immediately by the AXOLOTL and not just perma-banned, but in actual real trouble _outside_ of The Game, too.

“...Seriously kid, you okay?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”

\---

...Aaaaaand it’s official, this NPC really is not waiting for any responses from me to keep going. Gameplay should auto-pause for me while I’m trying to figure this stuff out, and how I want to respond, _if_ I want to respond. That’s a normal, basic, baseline setting, not something that requires some hacked-out mod.

...Maybe there’s a debuff that screws that up, too?

What do I do? Should I actually try treating this NPC seriously, like I would another demon, like it actually might be intelligent and aware, just in case I’m wrong?

“Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”

\---

...This is really an NPC, though, I’m _sure_ of it. And if this NPC’s not waiting for responses the way he should, then I _need_ to respond to him, and soon!

“Uh. I mean… eheh.”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”

\---

Ugh. Okay. I know what to do next. What I “ _should_ ” do next. Bill and I have all these things that we’ve talked about ad nauseum to infinity, all worked out in-advance. What to do when either of us doesn’t have all the right information on-hand to really play The Game the way each of us wants to play it. Stuff we’ve both agreed upon to do, that helps keep everything more consistent, no matter whose turn it is.

“...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”

\---

I should greet this NPC with a, ‘ _Hi! The name’s Bill Cipher!_ ’ -- or, if I’m supposed to already ‘know’ this one, give him a _‘Well-well-well. Look who it is! Did you miss me? Admit it, you missed me!’_ with big grins all-around, while scouring the logs and Bill’s notes for info on what to do next. I don’t like or want to screw things up for my brother, whatever stuff he’s got going on…

… _usually_ I don’t. But this play-session has been completely screwed up from start-to-finish, and I am so freaking tired and angry with Bill right now. My spider-bots haven’t come back with anything yet, either, and while I’ve updated the query with a cross-reference to ‘Ford’ -- who is probably that crazy NPC stalker who practically smashed my head in with a freaking gun -- there’s no guarantee that Bill knows or ever met either of these NPCs, so...

“C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... um...”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... um...”

\---

...You know what? Screw it. Just screw it! I _told_ Bill not to use that AXOLOTL-trap, and what did he do? Did he listen to me? --No!! So hey, if he’s gonna screw stuff up by being a dumbass on purpose, screwing _me_ over in doing whatever he did in taking up the AXOLOTL’s offer, and _not_ care about the consequences of that…

“...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... uh...”  
_??? name ???_ : “...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”

\---

If he can do stupid stuff and act like there are no consequences to his actions, then I don’t see any reason why _I_ have to stick to script! If he has some scam or deal or something going with this NPC and I screw this up for him, it’ll _serve him right!!_

“You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... uh...”  
_??? name ???_ : “...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?”

\---

I _like_ knowing things, and hey, this NPC’s _right here_ , isn’t he? And so am I! ...which is… _new_ , sure, let’s go with that, but...

“I mean, you can hear me, right? See that I’m talking? You’re looking at me and stuff. Gotta be able to see me...”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... uh...”  
_??? name ???_ : “...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?”  
_??? name ???_ : “I mean, you can hear me, right? See that I’m talking? You’re looking at me and stuff. Gotta be able to see me...”

\---

...this NPC is already providing me info (albeit probably unintentionally), and this NPC’s name is something I really want to know. It’s bugging the hell outta me, seeing all those question marks where this NPC’s name-designation should be. It’s something I don’t know, and I want to know it, and there’s no guarantee that Bill knew this NPC, right? It’s something I don’t know, and I want to know it _now_.

“I uh, don’t really know any sign language or anything, though...”

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... uh...”  
_??? name ???_ : “...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?”  
_??? name ???_ : “I mean, you can hear me, right? See that I’m talking? You’re looking at me and stuff. Gotta be able to see me...”  
_??? name ???_ : “I uh, don’t really know any sign language or anything, though...”

\---

So I glare at the private chat window in my mind’s eye for a moment...

\---

 _??? name ???_ : “Problem, kid?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You’ve been staring at me like…”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Seriously kid, you okay?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?”  
_??? name ???_ : “Uh. I mean… eheh.”  
_??? name ???_ : “...Kid? Um, wait. No habla inglés? Habla español?”  
_??? name ???_ : “C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... uh...”  
_??? name ???_ : “...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”  
_??? name ???_ : “You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?”  
_??? name ???_ : “I mean, you can hear me, right? See that I’m talking? You’re looking at me and stuff. Gotta be able to see me...”  
_??? name ???_ : “I uh, don’t really know any sign language or anything, though...”

\---

...and then I say:

“Yes, I can hear you. Yes, I can talk. Yes, I can speak French, Spanish, and English; sounds to me like English is your common-native-preferred, so let’s go with _that_. --I don’t _know_ how hard ‘Ford’ hit me, but it freaking _hurt_ and I’m pretty sure I lost consciousness for awhile there, so probably _pretty freaking hard!_ \-- **No** , I’m _not_ okay! And no, I don’t have ‘ _a_ problem’, I’ve got at _least_ **three-hundred** of them dancing in front of my eyes right now, and I’m not finished counting, and those are probably the _least_ of the ones I have. --But first things first. **YOU.** _\--WHAT IS YOUR NAME?_ ”

And yeah, I’m demanding; I’m leaning forward, making eye contact, the whole nine yards. --See? I can do in-person socialization when I have to! No sweat.

...and the NPC is freaking blinking at me, looking about as taken aback as I probably looked -- and definitely felt -- when I first got that private chat interface window from him when _he_ first started talking to _me_.

…

…

…

“Hello? Dimension 46’\\-F to _whoever_ -you-are? Are you grokking me?”

…

...

...He blinked at me. That’s all I got.

Seriously, I get no wait-for-response for a good two minutes straight, and now _this?_

“... _Hello?_ Tch. -- _Tu_ no habla inglés?”

No response. Just staring.

“ _C’mon_ , now...”

…

…

Well, crud. Looks like the NPC really did lock up on me.

...

...Maybe I shouldn’t have been responding in both the private chat window _and_ audibly? Oops.

…

...

\--Well, he started it, though!

Okay, fine. I’ll do _just_ the audio-only this time. Let’s see if that works any better.

“Hello? You parsing me _at all?_ ”

…

...

...He’s just freaking _staring_ at me, still!

Staring and blinking. That’s it. That’s all. That’s all I’m getting out of this person. _So dumb._

Can’t freaking believe this. Stupid buggy strange completely-broken ‘balanced’ dumbass NPCs, tossing stuff at me in interfaces they can’t even use!

This. _This right here_ is why I refuse to interact with NPCs! I really don’t know how or why Bill gets such a kick out of messing with them. They’re so _completely **useless!**_

Ugh.

\---


	3. Chapter 3

\---

Stan was worried at first. He saw the kid rouse, then sit up and open his eye, and then… completely freak the hell out, with the way the kid’s visible eye went so wide he could see the white around the edges. Stan actually felt pretty bad as he watched the kid immediately flinch back away from him and pull his arms up to shield his head, like the kid thought he was going to hit him.

Stan guessed that answered the question of whether the kid had gotten a good look at Ford before his brother had knocked the kid out.

But then the kid paused and slid his arms apart slightly, staring at him through the gap. And then slowly relaxed, lowering his arms, looking confused.

And then dropped his arms completely to his sides and stared at Stan like he had two heads.

...and then peered at Stan for a second intently, then seemed to get the mother of all headaches, with the way he half-collapsed in place, clutching at his head with both hands and clenching his teeth.

Stan started to lean forward slightly and was about to say something then, ask if he was alright, but stopped when the kid straightened up and Stan saw the look on his face.

The kid looked positively _HOMICIDAL_.

...aaaand Stan really did _not_ want _any_ of that directed at him, thanks -- not if he could help it. So he shut his mouth, sat right where he was, _quickly_ adopted an ‘I am a dumb nobody’ look, and didn’t say **anything** _at all_.

After awhile though, Stan found himself second-guessing himself on whether he’d actually read the kid right. Because that flash of murderous rage had vanished as quickly as it had come, and… the kid didn’t act on it, not in the least. He just continued to sit there and… think? The kid’s face was an open book, and Stan had _never_ seen anybody calm down so fast before -- it just wasn’t possible -- so he _had_ to have been imagining it, right? Or misunderstood it somehow?

And yet… he had seen what he had seen.

Stan watched as the kid’s expression kept cycling through emotions, one to the next: a more normal sort of anger, confusion, anger again, more confusion, bouts of concentration and sheer frustration, and everything else in-between.

And apparently, it wasn’t _him_ that the kid was mad at, exactly, either. Because it was like the kid was looking at him? But also _wasn’t_ exactly looking at him -- more like through him or past him, almost? If anything, the kid seemed completely caught up in his own head, whatever was going on with him. And, the more Stan watched him, the more he became convinced that the kid was barely paying any actual attention at all to _him_ , or his surroundings.

When the kid finally sighed and his shoulders slumped, his head dropping, looking more tired and mildly frustrated than anything else, Stan figured it’d be a good time to finally interrupt _whatever_ was going on inside this kid’s head. --Granted, he was used to hearing mutters from Ford, to go along with these sorts of facial expressions to give some actual context to whatever was potentially wrong, but he figured the kid was _probably_ similar to Ford in this regard, even if he wasn’t as vocal. From everything that had happened so far, Stan got the impression that this kid was more the brainy type, more like his brother than like him.

“Problem, kid?” Stan asked him, trying to make eye contact while pitching his voice in the way he usually did when he was actively trying to get somebody’s attention and wanted it to work.

And he got an immediate response.

The kid’s head shot up like a rocket and he looked utterly gobsmacked. It left Stan wondering if he’d done something wrong. It wasn’t like he hadn’t been speaking in plain English, right? It was almost like the kid was shocked that he'd said something, _anything_ , to him at all.

Actually, now that he thought about it… “You’ve been staring at me like…” maybe the kid hadn’t even _expected_ him to talk? ...No, more like the kid didn’t think he would be _capable_ of talking to him?

With the way the kid’s jaw dropped and his eyes bugged out a little, Stan wondered if maybe he should start feeling offended now, because he was _definitely_ getting ‘I just heard a dog talk to me’ vibes from this kid. ...Which, y’know, would be good if that was an actual con he was trying to pull off just then, except it wasn’t, so he wasn’t too thrilled over the kid’s otherwise maybe-kinda-funny response.

He kept his own reaction straight off of his face, though. No need to antagonize a kid that quick to anger, even if he seemed to lose the anger again just as quickly.

...Then again, maybe it wasn’t the kid’s fault? He didn’t look so good, and head injuries could really screw with a person’s emotional control, he’d found out the hard way. He’d always had to be kinda careful outside of the boxing ring right after a fight, whenever he’d gotten a pretty bad hit to the noggin -- and he’d started avoiding those kind of matches like the plague, after he’d been kicked out of the house at seventeen, once he saw what those kind of hits started doing to other people. No matter how much money was or wasn’t being offered or how desperately bad he needed it, some things just weren’t worth it; too much risk.

“...Seriously kid, you okay?” Stan tried again, almost tentatively. He had the eye contact down, at least, but he’d never had somebody take so long to say something back to him. He really was trying to get on the same wavelength as this kid, though. He wasn’t sure why it wasn’t working. He’d never had this much of a problem talking to a kid before.

The kid almost cringed away from him this time, his face going almost expressionless, except for around the eyes. The ‘you are a talking dog’ look was gone now, but the kid looked _taken aback_ almost, like he didn’t know what to do, how he should respond to him.

‘ _Well_ ,’ Stan thought. ‘ _At least I’ve gone from getting treated like odd-looking furniture, to ‘a talking dog?(!!?!?)’, to ‘another human just talked to me and I don’t know what to do!’ in about a minute flat._ ’ That was progress, right?

Except Stan couldn’t figure out how anybody could make that long in life, well into their teenage years, while having no clue how to talk to another human being. ‘ _...Is he hallucinating or something?_ ’ Stan wondered. Because that’d explain the ‘talking dog’ thing, if the kid was maybe seeing things.

“Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?” he didn’t quite blurt out, starting to really worry for the kid now, though he kept most of it under his knit cap and off of his face.

...At the slight change in expression on the kid’s face, Stan mentally frowned and revised his previous assessment to ' _really,_ really _doesn’t know what to do, and maybe a little panicked now?_ ’

Then it occurred to Stan that maybe that panic was from his bringing up Ford having hit the kid in the first place.

“Uh. I mean… eheh,” Stan said, scratching the side of his neck.

But after the kid’s reaction to that, Stan breathed an internal sigh of relief -- it wasn’t the hit. Now he was _sure_ that it was _definitely_ just a look of extreme discomfort the kid had going on at the idea of trying to talk to him, along with the ‘I really don’t know what to say’ look.

“...Kid?” Stan tried again, because the kid looked almost _conflicted_ now. Like he didn’t want to say something, but knew he should. “ Um, wait.” Stan muttered to himself, because it suddenly occurred to him -- maybe the _language_ was the problem? He’d run into that before, with illegal immigrants who didn’t want to admit they knew only Spanish, no English. “No habla inglés? Habla español?”

When the kid didn’t quite cringe again, Stan realized that Spanish was more a miss than a hit. He was maybe half-sure about there being some kind of a language barrier now, though.

“C’mon kid, I don’t know that many languages... um...”

The kid was still looking at him, but the kid had hunched his shoulders slightly now. And then the kid dropped eye contact ever-so-slightly as the kid started looking angry again, in that ‘angry but not angry at the person he was looking at’ way that he’d been looking and acting before.

So Stan tried again.

“...You speak-y the, uh, fran-say-ihs? Or something?”

He saw the kid take in a breath, looking a slightly different flavor of angry. He was obviously working through something.

Though, whatever it was...

“You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?” Stan said, covering a wince as it occurred to him that maybe that was a thing. That would also cause a lot of frustration in somebody who might _want_ to communicate, but might also _not_ want to, because they knew they probably wouldn’t be understood and it would just be a gigantic frustrating waste of time.

Stan stifled a sigh. That didn’t completely make sense though, because...

“I mean, you can hear me, right? See that I’m talking? You’re looking at me and stuff. Gotta be able to see me...”

The kid was struggling with _something_. And he looked less angry to Stan now, really just frustrated. So Stan figured that now was probably a good time to admit that...

“I uh, don’t really know any sign language or anything, though...”

...but Stan was still willing to _try_. He knew they could figure _something_ out, if only the kid would open up a little to him, just _try_ and communicate. Stan had been able to get by in several other countries, even without knowing the language, before, on a lot of different occasions. A conversation didn’t necessarily need _words_ \-- sometimes, a _lot_ of times, pointing and gestures and tone were enough.

And it wasn’t like he was planning on trying to debate the kid on one of Ford’s geeky subjects or anything, where it apparently mattered exactly what you said because half the point of that stuff was that you _had_ to get super-technical on the specifics of everything-always. No, all Stan wanted to know was just if the kid was all right, and--

“Yes, I can hear you. Yes, I can talk. Yes, I can speak French, Spanish, and English; sounds to me like English is your common-native-preferred, so let’s go with _that_. --I don’t _know_ how hard ‘Ford’ hit me, but it freaking _hurt_ and I’m pretty sure I lost consciousness for awhile there, so probably _pretty freaking hard!_ \-- **No** , I’m _not_ okay! And no, I don’t have ‘ _a_ problem’, I’ve got at _least_ **three-hundred** of them dancing in front of my eyes right now, and I’m not finished counting, and those are probably the _least_ of the ones I have. --But first things first. **YOU.** _\--WHAT IS YOUR NAME?_ ”

\--it was Stan’s turned to be floored. Left staring and utterly speechless.

Not because the kid had seemed to suddenly make up his mind and, with that decision, had changed the entirety of his body language.

It wasn’t the suddenly-aggressive squared-shoulder posture, or how the kid had slapped both hands down in front of him, or how the kid had leaned forwards to look him right in the eye as he’d spoken almost directly into his face. --It wasn’t even the fact that the kid did, in fact, know English, spoke it fluently like a native speaker with no real accent, and apparently knew enough Spanish and French to recognize those languages, too.

It didn’t have _anything_ to do with the kid having seemingly no speech impediment or other problem that might make it difficult for him to be able to talk to him at all. It didn’t even have anything to do with how weird it was that the kid, once he’d actually started talking, came across as a normal teen-aged kid with normal teenage frustration, flippant backtalk and all.

No, what had Stan freezing in place, going absolutely rigid and quickly slamming on the best blank poker face he could manage under the circumstances, while completely freaking out internally, had nothing to do with any of that.

It had nothing to do with that, and absolutely _everything_ to do with how, at the same time that the kid had been talking to him out loud, he’d heard _Bill Cipher’s_ two-tone high-pitched voice **echoing loudly _inside his head_** , saying the exact same words at the exact same time and variance in pitch and emphasis and cadence.

And if the echoing words inside his head hadn’t been SO _LOUD_ that they’d not only practically drowned out all rational thought, but also nearly _vibrated_ his _bones_ into jelly, he would’ve jumped up and run, pride and best-intentions be damned.

Because Bill Cipher was alive, even after he’d killed him. They’d lost. They could never win. _The triangle couldn’t die._

...But Stan could.

The only thing that kept Stan in place was a working survival instinct, and what little rational thought he had left: if he got up and ran, the insane triangle would almost certainly chase him down and _make_ him talk, but if he sat there and didn’t say anything, then maybe the triangle wouldn’t get suspicious enough to figure things out.

Because the last thing that the triangle-looking-like-a-kid had said had stuck with him: **YOU.** _\--WHAT IS YOUR NAME?_

\--If the triangle didn’t know who he was, then the triangle didn’t remember him. If the triangle couldn’t remember him -- or at least who he was enough to recognize him on sight or after hearing him -- then the triangle didn’t know enough to want him dead right away, and that was _definitely_ a state of affairs that Stan would very much like to extend indefinitely, if at all possible, if anybody asked him.

But nobody was asking him that, and Stan was freaking out, and he knew it. He couldn’t keep himself calm; he’d lost anything anywhere _close_ to calm within the first half-second of the triangle talking at him, the first _half-a-sentence_.

He was staring at the triangle, and freaking out, and he was pretty sure he was shaking slightly, and all he could really think as he sat there and blinked at the triangle while feeling faint enough to pass out was, ‘ _I am an idiot. I am a complete and utter moron. I shouldn’t have untied him. Ford told me he was the triangle, and I didn’t believe him. I deserve this. I don’t care if I deserve this -- I really don’t want to die horribly! --Where is Ford, and why is my brother not shooting the triangle in the face already?!?!?!_ ’

...Maybe because his brother’s sci-fi gun was inside the cooler he was sitting on? Oh, Ford was going to kill him, if the triangle didn’t do it first.

And then the triangle said:

“Hello? Dimension 46’\\-F to _whoever_ -you-are? Are you grokking me?”

And at that, Stan had to stifle a shudder. All he could do was blink in response as he mentally clung on by his fingernails and tried to ride his way through the utter horror that engulfed him.

Because he didn’t know what ‘are you grokking me?’ meant. --Or he _hadn’t_. Not until he’d heard the triangle say it in his head, and now he **did** : _do you understand me so thoroughly that you have merged with me and I have merged with you, until we are I, and I are we, and we hate-love-are-forever-frustrated-with each other as much as we do towards ourselves, because ourselves are now each other?_

The triangle was shoving things straight into his head that hadn’t been in there to begin with. The triangle was not only _inside_ his head, it was _messing with his head_. This was bad. This was very, very--

“... _Hello?_ Tch. -- _Tu_ no habla inglés?”

\--bad, so very bad, bad and bad and worse, and now Spanish was starting to sound almost the same as inglés-English did in his head and this was really, _really_ bad, and--

“ _C’mon_ , now...”

\--Stan barely kept himself from shuddering again, from cringing, tasted the tang of copper at his back teeth and almost lost the blank look he was trying desperately to keep affecting. He managed it anyway, even if he didn’t quite know _how_. But the triangle’s too-loud echoing drowning-out-sane-thought bone-vibrating thought-injecting voice was getting to him in a bad way inside his head, and he had no idea how Ford had ever managed to survive nearly four years of this way back when, talking to this demon on a near-nightly basis.

He saw the triangle open his mouth again, and Stan was honest-to-god absolutely dead-certain that he was about two seconds away from just breaking down, curling in on himself, and beginning to _cry_ like a baby -- forget manliness, sometimes crying was justifiable, okay?! -- and he was desperately trying to brace himself for the next round of echoing madness _anyway_ , when...

“Hello? You parsing me _at all?_ ”

...the triangle’s voice didn’t echo in his head that time.

And he had no idea what ‘parsing’ was.

Stan reflexively pulled in a breath and almost swayed in place in relief, except… those echoes from before weren’t completely gone. The jarring vibrations of all that other stuff were still sweeping up and down his bones, hadn’t yet died away completely, and they were still enough to keep his teeth set slightly on-edge.

But now… he _was_ able to concentrate a lot more on how the triangle looked and sounded _outside_ of his head, again, and…

...the triangle-looking-like-a-kid was frowning at him, and that frown was turning into a glare. The triangle demon-kid was _annoyed_ with _him specifically_ , and then that annoyance-at-him quickly shifted to _anger_ -at-him, and Stan did _not_ want to know what the triangle was going to do to him next.

So Stan quickly pasted on a fake smile and said:

“--Uh, hello to you, too? What’s parsing?”

...because if the triangle was annoyed because he wasn’t responding to it, and he only responded to the triangle when it _wasn’t_ trying to vibrate him to pieces with its voice from the inside-out, then maybe the triangle would get the hint and keep on _not doing that_ anymore if it wanted him to respond. Ever again. Never getting talked to inside his head like that again would be preferable, in Stan’s opinion.

And the triangle blinked at him.

And then the triangle frowned at him slightly.

“...Understand,” the triangle said, peering up at him. “Do you _understand_ me?” it stressed.

“Uhm, yeah?” Stan said, playing the idiot, but only so far. “I speak English.”

“No,” said the triangle, looking annoyed all over again, “I meant--”

And then the triangle stopped.

And looked to the side.

And rubbed the side of its right hand under its left eye, the one without the eyepatch on it.

And let out a _sigh_ , of all things.

“Yeah, okay,” it muttered. Then it looked back up at him.

“You said, ‘I mean, you can hear me, right?’ --Yes, I can hear you,” the triangle said.

And then it stopped talking and looked at him intently.

“Um, okay,” said Stan. “I kinda got that.”

The triangle nodded at him once.

“You also asked whether I could see that you were talking, but that question was rhetorical. You answered it yourself. Correct?” And then it stopped talking again.

Stan slowly nodded once.

The triangle nodded back.

“You said, ‘You, uh, you _can_ talk, right?’ --Yes, I can talk.”

After a beat of silence from the triangle, Stan nodded. “Got that.”

The triangle nodded again.

“You asked if I could speak French, if I didn’t speak English, if I speak Spanish instead? --Yes, I can speak French, Spanish, and English.”

Stan nodded and felt like he was going out on a limb just a bit, when he said, “Glad we’re going with English. My Spanish sucks, and I only know how to curse in French.”

But when the triangle tilted its human-looking head at him and smiled slightly, looking… human…

...Stan realized he was staring again, because...

...it, he, Bill Cipher? Actually _looked human_ , seemed _normal_ , had given him a normal human response, and...

Gave him a wry smirk. “You asked, ‘Geez, how hard did Ford _hit_ you?’ And…” The human-looking triangle’s eyes went half-lidded. “--I don’t _know_ how hard ‘Ford’ hit me,” he drawled out, as Stan looked on, “But it freaking _hurt_ and I’m pretty sure I lost consciousness for awhile there,” and the triangle squared his jaw a bit as he finished up with, “So probably _pretty freaking hard._ ”

And all Stan could say to that was, “Sorry. I tried to clean you up a bit.”

The triangle blinked for a moment and straightened slightly. “You… _what?_ ”

“I, uh,” Stan couldn’t believe that he was actually talking to the triangle like a person, here. A person who he didn’t necessarily want to punch in the face, or try to con and take advantage of, even. ...And if he didn’t still have a very uncomfortable low-grade vibrating _HUMMMMM_ still thrumming its way through his bones and making his back teeth ache, he’d probably be doubting his own memories right about now, about whether he’d actually heard the triangle inside his head a while ago, because Ford hadn’t rushed outside and...

...Stan physically shook his head slightly, then said, “I bandaged your head. You were, uh, bleeding a little from the hit. Uh, I think Ford may have… overreacted… a little?” Or maybe his brother hadn’t overreacted at all. ...Except for the fact that his brother seemed to be _underreacting_ now.

“You…” the human-kid-looking triangle said slowly, then reached up and felt around carefully -- twitching sorts of fingertaps inwards almost too hard then quickly jerking them back again, like he was half-expecting not to feel anything and then overcompensating when he did?

As he watched the triangle do this, two things finally occurred to Stan.

The first was that the triangle had really only sounded like the triangle inside his head. He actually sounded pretty normal outside of it.

The second was that the triangle had sounded like the triangle _**inside his head**_. So what if Ford, who was inside the Shack doing who-knew-what in getting ready to try the Zodiac Circle thing again, had maybe only heard what the triangle had said _out loud?_ Stan had heard the triangle talking to him inside his head, but what if Stan had been the _only_ one to hear the triangle talking to him inside his head?

“Huh,” he heard the human-kid-looking triangle say quietly, then look up at him, curiously, almost puzzled.

The third thing that occurred to Stan was that maybe Bill Cipher was actually inside his head, and just messing him by saying what the kid had said at the same time the kid had said it. But he was pretty sure it wasn’t that last one, because Ford had said there would be warning signs if Bill was coming back, and Ford would’ve noticed something was wrong before and definitely said something to him about it if that had happened. Right?

The teenaged-human-looking triangle(??) sighed again and looked away from Stan, down at the couch he was sitting on, then up again. He seemed a bit tired, almost.

“Are you okay, kid?” Stan asked him, then didn’t quite manage to stifle his wince. He’d asked that before, earlier. It had been one of the first few things he’d asked, and...

From the slightly bemused look the triangle(?)/kid got, the kid had noticed his ‘mistake’.

“No, I’m not okay,” the kid began, “and as for whether I have a problem…”

And it was about that point that Stan finally realized that the triangle had been repeating himself. He’d been… _patient_ with Stan, which was weird -- nobody was _ever_ patient with him. In fact, the triangle had been specifically repeating and then answering the things Stan had asked him before, when… he’d already answered them all-at-once before, and that was even weirder, that the triangle would do that all over again.

Except...

“No, I don’t have a problem, I’ve got… a _lot_ of them. And...”

...the teenaged-looking triangle wasn’t just repeating himself exactly anymore. He’d actually started to change up his responses just a bit. This time, he wasn’t sounding nearly as sarcastic or angry, but...

“...it’s going to take me awhile to deal with those problems. But--”

...he was still using the same _words_ he’d used before in the things he was repeating, one at a time, start to finish, and the last thing the triangle-teen had asked him… had been--!!

“ _\--Y’know, I don’t think we actually introduced ourselves to each other!_ ” Stan cut in quickly, in too-strained tones, while trying desperately to plaster on a smile and not break out into a cold sweat as he did so. “Why don’t _you_ go first!”

And the triangle-teen’s eyebrows went up in a surprised frown.

And Stan was kicking himself mentally already, because what was he going to say _now?_ He’d maybe only stalled the triangle-teen for a few seconds _at best_ , and--

...the triangle didn’t answer him right away. He actually looked a bit taken aback.

...No, he didn’t just look taken aback. The triangle-teen now had the _exact same look_ of extreme discomfort going on as before, the _exact same_ ‘I really don’t know what to say’ look that had looked so painfully angry and annoyed that it had had Stan trying to figure out if the kid spoke a different language or something.

For a frozen moment, Stan wondered if the problem was that the triangle didn’t remember his own name, then quickly discarded the thought -- the triangle wouldn’t have been struggling with himself the way he had been earlier if that had been the case. Stan was pretty sure he was reading him right, in reading him like he would a human -- because, hey, the triangle was acting and responding like a person, right?

No, it definitely wasn’t a memory issue, he was pretty sure. Stan knew what those were like, and if that had been the case, then the triangle definitely wouldn’t have been so very specifically angry at _somebody_ about...

Oh. Oh, _wow_. Oh, man. Stan felt like he was having deja vu or something. This was so… _bizzare_.

Wow. Just… wow.

“...Y’know,” Stan said, carefully feeling his way forward just on the off-chance he was wrong. “A nickname or whatever is fine,” he began, cold-reading the triangle like his life depended on it -- because maybe it did. So when the triangle’s expression shifted to one of tired and almost depressed finality and the triangle-teen started to open his mouth, Stan immediately continued in a direction he really hadn’t expected to need to go in: “--But I’d really rather know your full name.”

And he knew he’d gotten it right when the triangle’s eyes went a bit wide and his mouth snapped shut.

“You-- you want to know my… _true name?_ ” the triangle said, taken aback. then his visible eye narrowed. “... _Why?_ ” he asked, slow and suspicious.

“Well,” Stan said breezily, all the while knowing he was probably gonna get a ‘no’ on... “We _could_ just go with trading aliases instead, if you want.”

“‘Aliases’...” the triangle echoed. With the way the triangle’s eyes slid sideways again, and the expression on his face, Stan was practically shaking his head mentally and holding back a sigh. Deja vu, and then some. More like a combination of Ford _and_ Dipper on this one. Oh, man. “I, I don’t…” The triangle looked down and grimaced.

“--Look,” Stan said, getting a burst of inspiration. “How about this. We trade -- true names, okay? -- and if either of us has a reputation that the other one of us knows about, we don’t hold it against them! Blank slate. Sound good?” Because as far as Stan was concerned, if this triangle didn’t want to do anything to him, he was good with that, and if he could basically get what amounted to a carte blanche promise out of this triangle not to kill him for killing 'Bill Cipher’ before...

“You don’t--” the triangle-teen let out a slight disbelieving laugh, then shook his head. “Oh, you’re not going to hold to that, I’m pretty sure,” the triangle said with a rueful, pained smile.

“Try me,” said Stan.

The triangle-teen moved his jaw side to side a bit.

“You tell me your true name, and I’ll tell you mine,” said the triangle-teen.

“I asked first,” Stan said, feeling no compunction about lying whatsoever.

The triangle-teen’s eye narrowed. “Does it matter who goes first?”

“Huh?” said Stan. Then he saw the trap. “Well…” he prevaricated purposefully.

“Because if we’re not holding reputations against each other--” the triangle-teen began.

“--We aren’t,” Stan agreed all too readily, then flipped the trap around. “But if it _really_ doesn’t matter to you, then why _don’t_ you go first?” Stan said.

The triangle-teen grimaced and looked away. Looked down. Looked back up at him again.

“ _Fine_ ,” the triangle-teen said. And then he said: “William Triangle Cipher.”

But at the same time, Stan _also_ heard the triangle say it inside his head again, and when he did, it came out just a little different. It came out: _William ∆ Cipher_

It echoed through his head, the sound of his voice just as LOUD as the first time, last time, every time in-between, with the same two-tone high-pitch and everything. It again-and-still almost drowned out any other thoughts in his head for awhile while he was hearing it, and vibrated his bones all over again.

But instead of that echo joining in on the symphony of discordant vibrations that had never really gone away, amplifying everything all over again to a level of near-hurt that made him almost want to cry out in pain, _just like had happened before_ …

...that very uncomfortable low-grade vibrating _HUMMMMM_ that had still been making his back teeth ache and thrumming its way through his bones suddenly just STOPPED.

It cut out like a hammerblow slamming something into place -- a missing piece -- like a damper that should've been there to begin with to prevent that ongoing rattling roar.

The echo _and_ the hum **died out completely** once the triangle-teen finished telling him his name.

It left Stan nearly agape with such a wash of pure relief that the very next thing he did was blurt out: “Stanley Stanford Pines.”

And only about a second after he finished speaking, Stan’s brain went ‘ _erk!_ ’

“--Uh, I mean. That is--!” Stan stammered out almost immediately, because not only had he told the triangle his name, when he hadn’t meant to, but he’d-- “That’s not really my middle name!” His middle name was Filbrick.

The triangle was blinking at him.

“Middle name?” the triangle named ‘William’ said, and raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t _ask_ for your middle name,” Stan was told. “I asked you for your full, true name.”

“I, yes, but--” ‘’ _Oh, Ford is gonna kill me, he really is; I have to fix this._ ’ “I mean, the uh, eheh, name on my birth certificate says--”

And now ‘William’ looked even more amused. “I didn’t ask for the name on your ‘birth certificate’, either,” and it left Stan staring for a moment.

“Your name,” the teenaged-looking triangle all-but-breathed out, “is _Stanley Stanford Pines_ ,” and ‘William’ looked relaxed and almost lazily pleased as he practically purred out Stan’s ‘true name’. What ‘William’ said after that seemed to be almost an afterthought, and definitely a rhetorical question: “Correct?” He tilted his head at Stan. “You are _Stanley_ first, and a _Stanford_ second, and a _Pines_ at third remove.”

Stan nodded once, almost helplessly, staring. He couldn’t not. His brain sorta rejected the idea of being a ‘Filbrick’ like his dad, but he’d been a ‘Stanford’ for years -- hell, he’d been a ‘Stanford’ for more than half his life, when he thought about it, and wasn’t _that_ a scary thought? And after being kicked outta the family… a ‘Pines’ third was the best he ever could’ve hoped for, and luckily again was. Because the kids...

Stan pulled in a breath. ‘ _Oh_ geez _. The kids!_ ’ If the triangle remembered him now, from his name, then--

\--but the teenaged-looking triangle didn’t seem to have recognized or remembered him yet, though, so… maybe this really was a different triangle?

Stan slowly breathed out and tried to force himself to relax.

‘ _Man, Ford is gonna lose his shit if I manage to make friends with one a’ these_ without _the whole world-ending gig,_ ’ Stan thought. ‘ _Heh._ ’

“Right, yeah,” Stan said finally. And because he always had to push things, he told the triangle... “Um, anyway, most people just call me Stan.”

He was nodded at, once. “Well…” the triangle began, but then the triangle got that tired look in his eyes and he looked away as he seemed to start all over again. “...Well.” He got that struggling-with-himself look again, then seemed almost resigned as he said, “Well…” and then trailed off again, and suddenly his whole expression seemed to shift.

It shifted into a wide grin that looked… more like a grimace actually, given the look that was coupled with it in the triangle’s eyes. And when he began again, with almost a sardonic lilt to his voice, “You can call me--!"...

“--Will,” Stan said firmly, overriding him, with a smile of his own.

And the look of utter _shock_ that crossed the triangle’s face just cemented firmly what Stan had been beginning to think a good while ago, but hadn’t really been sure about until that very moment.

What Stan _hadn’t_ expected though, was the _fear_ and the nervousness and the sheer level of _panic_ that followed that shock.

And then the abrupt 180-turn-around straight to denial.

“-- **No** ,” the triangle said abruptly, sitting ramrod straight, his body almost vibrating visibly with strain. “That’s not--” The triangle let out a nervous laugh. “You-- _Don’t call me that_.”

“Why not?” Stan said simply. “Will is short for William, isn’t it?”

“That’s _not_ \--” The triangle shook visibly, then pulled in a breath and seemed to mentally reach for calm, as he physically curled his fingers into the couch cushions below him. “You can call me **Bill** ,” the triangle told him flatly.

‘ _Not on your life,_ ’ thought Stan. “Yeah, no. I like calling you Will better.”

The triangle gritted his teeth. “ **Bill.** ” Before Stan could respond, he continued, “--Or William, if you must, but--”

“--William, then,” Stan said easily, crossing his arms.

The teenaged-looking triangle snarled something that sounded vaguely curse-like under his breath, and his shoulders drooped a bit, but… while, he didn’t look _happy_ with him, he didn’t look _un_ happy, either.

And at least he didn’t look afraid anymore. Nervous still, yeah, but not afraid.

“Can’t believe that I’m actually--” the teenaged-looking triangle muttered under his breath, looking away sideways again. And when his shoulders came up a bit in pure ‘beleaguered teen’, it left Stan having to stifle a smile of relief.

And that was when Ford walked out of the Shack at a normal pace -- looking a bit more frazzled than usual, but just as half-distracted as he always was when his mind was in a million other places at once -- while calling out, “Stanley--”

And stopped in his tracks when he saw the teenaged-looking triangle.

Ford stared down at the triangle-teen.

The triangle-teen stared up at Ford.

And then--

\--

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: ...there was a cliffy! *muhahahahah!*
> 
> ;)


End file.
